This will be a one-word review. Wow. That’s it. Thank you and goodnight. There are no other words that will adequately express my awe and wonder at the sheer mastery, originality, wit, humour, humanity and heartbreak of The Rabbit Hutch.

Set in the fictional town of Vacca Vale, Indiana, the central character is an 18-year- old girl called Blandine Watkins who is whip-smart, a scholarship drop-out, and a one-time foster child who has now ‘aged out’ of foster care. Blandine is beautiful and otherworldly. Men are magnetically (dangerously) drawn to her, while women keep their distance, perhaps unsettled by her strangeness. Blandine is obsessed with saints and mystics: girls and women who experienced religious rapture through suffering. She has been known to start conversations in laundromats by relaying stories of her favourite saint-of-the-moment.

Blandine lives in La Lapinière (locally known as The Rabbit Hutch), an affordable housing complex where the walls are so thin, privacy is not an option for the various occupants. There’s the online obituary writer who moderates comments, but lets the son of a famous actress have his rage- filled say before she takes him down. There’s the mother who doesn’t like looking into the eyes of her baby. There’s Ida and Reggie, both in their seventies. Outside of the building, there’s the music teacher who is married to Vacca Vale royalty – a descendant of the illustrious Zorn motorcar dynasty.

On a hot and steamy Wednesday night in July, Blandine Watkins exits her body, the culmination of a series of events involving various Vacca Vale inhabitants, whose lives intersect in ways that you’ll never guess.

Did I mention that this is the work of a debut author? It is astonishing that someone can be so accomplished, polished and sharp as a writer, that they can write a book that is pitch perfect right down to the very last line. There are no words to describe how brilliant The Rabbit Hutch is. Which is why, as I stated, this is a one-word review.